Sunday, 30 August 2015

Simply Good Food TV and review of The Art of Making Gelato.

Well, this month has been a foodtastic month for Food Glorious Food. A couple of my recipes have been featured in The Guardian and The Telegraph and I'm incredibly excited to share that I will be filming a Jamaican food series over at Simply Good Food TV. If you are unsure of what Simply Good Food TV is, it is a brand new app where you can watch all your favourite chefs, alongside up and coming chefs in one place. How fabulous is that? The app is available to download on your IPad or Android and it's free to install. I'm heading to Jamaican next week so I may be further inspired, but this is the cuisine I grew up, enjoyed (especially during my elongated 6 week summer breaks as a child) and am so excited to share with you.

I can't promise to bring you sunshine whilst I am away in Jamaica, but I can encourage you to enjoy the very last days of Summer, with a dish that is synonymous with summer: Gelato and ice-cream.

The Art of Making Gelato: 50 Flavours To Make At Home by Morgan Morano is a great introductory book for those that love the cold dessert. I'll be honest, I've never made my ice-cream up until this year and haven't been satisfied with the ice-cream that's available in the supermarkets. I still had my ice-cream fix when I've visited food festivals, but this book has helped me create the beautiful ice-cream that I sampled when visiting Italy. I do think it helps if you purchase an ice-cream maker but there are instructions to make your own ice-cream without an ice-cream maker in this book.

The Art of Making Gelato first gives a thorough introduction to ice-cream, gelato and sorbets, alongside the ideal home gelato machines, tools and ingredients. There is a very comprehensive step-by-step guide to making gelato and sorbetto- which I feel is invaluable as there are easy to follow pictures to make fail-proof gelato and sorbets.

The following chapters include:

The Basics, recipes to try include Italian Espresso and Chocolate Chip.

Sorbet, for those that fancy something a little lighter, recipes to try include: Lemon, Orange, Raspberry and Forrest Berries.

I have been experimenting with different ice-cream flavours and although the pictures shown below is not the recipe given, this is a wonderful book for basic ice-cream ideas of flavour combination.

The recipe that I chose to share is Creme Brûlée ice-cream, everything which I love about ice-cream: rich, creamy, delicious and indulgent.

Ingredients

48g milk powder

215g granulated sugar

1 pinch of salt

20g tapioca starch

250g heavy cream

600g whole milk

4g vanilla extract

33g light corn syrup (golden syrup)

4 egg yolks

1 vanilla bean, sliced down the middle and opened, seeds scraped out

granulated sugar for caramelising

Prepare

1) Mix all the milk powder, sugar, salt and tapioca starch in a bowl.

2) Add the heavy cream, whole milk and vanilla extract and whisk well to incorporate all of the dry ingredients into the liquid.

3) Whisk in the corn syrup and egg yolks.

Cook

4) Pour the mixture into a 1.42 litter saucepan, using a spatula to scrape the sides of the bowl. Whisk in the vanilla bean seeds. Place the saucepan on medium-high heat and cook, whisking continuously to prevent any burning or clumping. Whisk slowly in the beginning and increase speed as the mixture gets warmer and begins to steam and thicken. It should thicken without boiling after 8-10 minutes on the heat: watch carefully so it doesn't burn. Once the mixture has thickened enough to coat the back of a spoon, continue cooking 15 seconds longer, whisking vigorously. Then immediately remove from the heat.

5) Pour the mixture into a clean glass or stainless-steel bowl and lay plastic we rap directly on the surface to prevent a skin from forming on top. Allow the mixture to sit for 30-45 minutes, until no longer hot. Then place in the refrigerator to cool completely, about 4 hours. If the mixture needs to be used right away, submerge most of the bowl in an ice bath and let sit 30 to 40 minutes, refreshing the ice if necessary.

6) Once the mixture has cooled completely and thickened further, pour it into the bowl of the gelato machine and churn the gelato according to the manufacturer's directions. The gelato will expand and should spin unit lit's thick and creamy but still soft enough to scoop into a storage container, about 30 to 55 minutes.

7) Using a rubber spatula, scoop the gelato into a glass storage container that would be appropriate for serving. Make sure it is evenly distributed in the container and then smooth out the gelato's surface a much as possible.

8) Press a piece of plastic wrap or parchment paper directly on the surface of the gelato, seal with an airtight lid, and place in the freezer.

9) Freeze until very firm, at least 10 hours. After 10 hours, pull the gelato from the freezer, remove the parchment paper or plastic wrap, and use a spatula or other utensil to smooth out of the surface of the gelato one more time. Place the gelato back in the freezer for another 10 minutes while you prepare the torch.

Brûlée

10) Sprinkle enough sugar on the gelato to cover the surface. Pick up the dish and lightly tilt in all directions so that the sugar coats the entire the surface. With the torch flame setting on a medium-low heat the surface, lightly caramelising the first layer of sugar. Spend no more than 5 minutes going over the entire surface and then return the gelato, uncovered to the freezer for 20 minutes. It's important to work as quickly as possible to snare that the gelato does not melt. Add a second coat of sugar to the surface of the gelato and repeat the caramelising process two more times, browning the last layer of sugar as much as possible. The last layer may take a itte more time to get the sugar to caramelise and fully cane colour.

11) Place the gelato in the freezer one sat time for about an hour to allow the surface of the gelato to freeze and the creme brûlée is ready to serve.

Serve

12) Enjoy the fresh gelato as soon as possible. If using after 2 days, allow 8 to 12 minutes for the gelato to soft outside of the freezer before eating.

Thanks to the lovely people at Race Point Publishing, I have three copies of The Art of Making Gelato to giveaway to readers of my blog, all you need to do is follow the below instructions:

Follow the instructions on the rafflecopter widget.

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